


You're a Good One, Bucky Barnes

by ScreamQueenBee (screamqueenbee)



Category: The Avengers (Marvel) - All Media Types
Genre: Bucky meets Liho for the first time, Cat Love, Christmas is mentioned, F/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2016-01-09
Updated: 2016-01-09
Packaged: 2018-05-12 17:07:46
Rating: Not Rated
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,512
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/5673874
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/screamqueenbee/pseuds/ScreamQueenBee
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>The aftermath of a date.</p>
            </blockquote>





	You're a Good One, Bucky Barnes

**Author's Note:**

  * For [Lex_Sparrow](https://archiveofourown.org/users/Lex_Sparrow/gifts).



> For Lex_Sparrow/thewanderingsoldier's prompt "Natasha introduces Bucky to Liho"

Liho didn’t like people.

He never had, even when he was that scraggly little ball of mud soaked claws and tail curled up on Natasha’s kitchen window sill. She brought him inside, just to clean him up and send him on his way, she didn’t want a dead kitten where she washed her dishes, and he fought her like he had the devil in him.

Liho tore her up with needle-like claws and teeth, but Nat got him clean and wrapped up in an old wash cloth from her medicine cabinet, fed him the milk from her fridge with an eye dropper, then put him in a basket cushioned with her SHIELD issued sweat shirt when she went to bed. But he was there when she woke up in the morning and every morning since then.

Natasha always claimed that it was a relationship of convenience: Liho kept the mice and bugs out of her various places of residence and she kept him out of the elements, but everyone else knew she was lying through her teeth, especially James. James knew how he felt about his own little rescue, Whisky, and there was no way someone could take an animal in and not fall head over heels for them.

He’d never met the now old cat. When he and Natasha got together, it was either at his own apartment or one of the two that Stark and Potts kept for them at Avengers Tower. James understood, Natasha space was sacred to her and as far as he knew, even Clint hadn’t been to her new place. He didn’t even know where in New York it was, except that it was close to the Tower.

But now, he was sitting in the passenger seat of Natasha’s sports car after what he would consider a pretty successful evening out. Dinner and the symphony, and no earth shattering or space rending disasters in sight. Playing at being a normal couple for once, like none of the intervening history between them had happened. His hand on her knee, thumb rubbing the bruises from her latest field mission as she turned off onto a street that didn’t lead to his own apartment.

“Where are we going?” James only dimly cared, figuring that she had plans for the ending of their evening, which was so rare that he was willing to go along with it. He knew all too well the secret toll that nights out took on Natasha, the exhaustion that came with the freedom of making decisions for herself after so many years of being told to do what and when. He could bear it more easily that she could, he’d been free before the wars and the Soldier, she’d only had options open to her after her defection.

Natasha smiled a little, eyes still on the road in front of her. “I thought we could spend the evening at mine. That way we won’t be disturbed.” She glanced over to gauge his reaction, James grinned and squeezed her knee.

“Sounds like a plan to me.”

They didn’t speak for the rest of the ride, which wasn’t far. Natasha parked in front of a quaint little brownstone, nodding to him as she turned the car off and reached for her handbag in the backseat. “This is it.”

It was homey from the sidewalk, with a miniature Christmas tree on the equally small porch and a cheery swirl of lights around the stair railings leading up to the door. A modern-looking wreath of bare branches and mistletoe hung on the door.

It looked like a Christmas card, and it was almost hard for James to believe that Natasha lived there with the façade of professionalism in all aspects of her life that she put forth to everyone.

Natasha slid her arm through James’s, smiling at him when he looked at her. “It’s cold out here, let’s get inside.” He nodded dumbly and followed her up the steps, watching her unlock the door before she stopped again. “One thing. The cat.”

“What about him?”

“He doesn’t really warm up to new people very well. And he’s a fighter, just be ready for that.”

The front door opening and the low growling from within the brownstone occurred simultaneously. At first, James thought it was a radiator or Natasha’s fridge, but then he saw the sleek, black cat sidling up to him, hazel eyes luminous in his dark fur. He had a particular kind of walk, a limp in one of his back legs, and the fur around his mouth and chin was whitening like the old dogs James and Steve used to feed as kids.

James bent down and offered the backs of his fingers for Liho’s inspection while Nat put their coats in the closet and changed clothes. The cat sniffed at them, curling grey whiskers moving with each breath. The cat seemed to be okay with that, so he decided to try a scratch behind the ears…

The cat let out a loud, long warning hiss and all the hair rose up on his hackles and along his back, then he lunged at James’s wrist. His teeth sank into the chunky weave of his sweater, and Natasha came running.

“Liho! Bad cat!” She skidded to a stop in front of them and the cat instantly released him and jumped into his mistress’ arms. She smoothed down his ragged fur, her concern focused on James. “Are you alright? He’d didn’t break the skin, did he?”

He shook his head. “No, I’m sorry. I shouldn’t have tried to pet him.” It was his fault and, honestly, he didn’t blame the cat. Someone he didn’t know coming into his house, potentially to hurt Natasha? James would have acted the same way. Cats knew people in some ways better than people knew people.

Natasha tutted Liho about biting people and took him into the kitchen and his plush bed on a chair in the corner before returning to him.

“I’m sorry. I didn’t think he’d get that worked up about you.” She pulled up his sleeve and inspected the reddened skin for herself. It wasn’t broken, and he wasn’t bleeding. “All the people who want to hurt you, I’d hoped Liho wasn’t one of them.”

James could have laughed. “It’s okay, Nat.” He leaned down and kissed her, squeezing her hands reassuringly. “That’s just cats. He’ll warm up to me, I promise.”

 

An hour later, Nat had opened a bottle of wine and almost finished it off by herself as she watched James try and tempt her cat into friendship with bits of chicken and his scarf. She had to admit that it might actually be working. Liho had brought James his favorite catnip bird, modelled after Redwing (“Sam can’t be happy about that.” He’d said with a laugh.) and had only taken a couple more swipes at him. James grinned the whole way through it, and she was half-convinced that smile had to had charmed her devil cat, just like it had her.

James made a surprised sound as Liho came closer than he had before, and climbed into his lap to chew on Redwing’s few remaining feathers, and a motion of absolute success that in a two hours he’d tamed her beast.

Next second, Nat was sitting next to him, leaning on his arm. “I guess that settles it.”

James turned to look at her, face confused. “Settles what?”

She shrugged, finishing off her glass to bolster her courage. “Well, we’ve been doing this dating thing for a while-”

He snorted. “That’s kind of an understatement, Nata.”

“- and I know your lease is up at the end of January.” She shrugged again. “I was thinking you and Whisky could move in here with me and Liho.”

“Really?” James couldn’t believe it, he’d pretty much settled on the idea of living separately for the rest of the course of their relationship. It wasn’t something he really minded, he was used to living on his own, but this? This was something he hadn’t ever expected. Him asking her to move it, yeah, but this was big. “I mean, of course we’ll move in… What about the cats? What if they don’t like each other?”

She shook her head fondly at him. “I haven’t just been leaving things at your place because I’m forgetful. I’ve been switching their toys for months so they’d know each other’s scent. I mean, Liho isn’t getting any younger and, frankly, your cat needs someone to teach him how to act like a proper cat.

He couldn’t help but laugh. “Don’t make fun of him, he tries his best.” James leaned in and kissed her, soft and sweet. “You’ve been planning this for a while haven’t you?”

“We were all waiting on you, James.”

James leaned back against the couch, taking her with him. “That sounds like my entire life, everyone’s waiting on me to get my act together.”

“It’s a good one.” Natasha teased, tucking her head under his chin. “You’re a good one, Bucky Barnes.”


End file.
